In our current environment and lifestyles, many substances or conditions once considered safe are found to be sources of adverse health and illness. For example, humans are often exposed to various chemicals, pharmaceuticals, vaccines, therapeutic agents, pathogens, electromagnetic radiation, excess or deficiencies of nutrients, food additives, food supplements, electromagnetic radiation, and numerous other exogenous insults that may have unforeseen and adverse effects on our health. Often, these substances or conditions are determined to be sufficiently benign at a particular level due to inadequacies in testing; however, the level is later determined to impart adverse effects on health. It may take years or decades of epidemiological or experimental research in order to determine that a substance or condition once considered safe may actually be related to or a source of adverse health and illness. As a result, humanity often becomes the test subject for many substances or conditions that are used in various consumer goods, foods, plastics, and manufacturing practices.
To prevent such uncontrolled experimentation on unsuspecting human subjects, there is a great need for broad, sensitive assays that are able to detect the adverse health consequences of any agent or condition in a living model. While science has provided many types of assays that can be conducted to determine the effects of substances or exposures at cellular and molecular levels, a biological target and detectable effect of the substance must be known. Without any prior knowledge that a substance or exposure is affecting a certain biological pathway, such organ- or pathway-specific assays as general screens for toxic affects.
Thus, it would be advantageous to have an assay that can identify overall health status of an organism in response to a particular substance or combination of substances or exposure to certain conditions. It would also be beneficial to be able to determine a particular aspect of health that is impacted so that further studies of the biological pathways can be devised and conducted.